E-cigarette shop sparks excitement in Bridgeport

And if you’re a smoker who hasn’t made the switch to vaping yet but you truly have a desire to quit tobacco, odds are Scavello will convert you to the e-smoking way of life and have you puffing away in nothing flat.

Electronic cigarettes are about the same size as the real thing, but are battery-powered to deliver nicotine in a vapor rather than tobacco smoke.

They helped the Bridgeport native kick the “lung dart” habit more than a year ago and he decided to tell the world by opening the area’s first e-cig emporium and lounge, The World’s Finest Vape Shop.

In the process, the persuasive and uniquely credible salesman put his passion to work for him by becoming the World’s Finest Vape Spokesman.

“It’s one thing to sell something you have no ties to, but it’s so much easier to sell something that’s actually working for you,” he said, sitting in the small shop’s vaping lounge, furnished with an overstuffed couch, flat-screen TV, books and a coffee maker. “I smoked cigarettes for 15 years and I’m an example of how good this thing works.”

Scavello discovered e-cigarettes in Cape Coral, Fla., while visiting his parents, who were on vacation there.

“Down South there are shops like this all over the place,” said Scavello, who added it’s just a matter of time before storefronts like his start popping up everywhere.

“My parents don’t drink or smoke, so as a smoker I’ve always been like the black sheep of the family, although I never smoked in their presence,” he said.

He recalled feeling guilty one day when his dad climbed into his truck and had an allergic reaction to residual smoke, which Scavello thought he had masked with air freshener.

That’s when he wandered into a vape shop to find out more about the misty trend.

“It was a vaping lounge, and I thought, ‘This is really cool,’ so I bought a kit, went back the next day and bought another kit. I went back five days in a row and bought five kits. I was so drawn into it, so absorbed that I just had to have more. It was amazing, because I literally picked one up and never touched a cigarette again.”

He even turned on his 80-year-old grandmother — a smoker for more than 60 years — to the joys of vaping, he said.

Scavello researched the rapidly growing industry for eight months and decided in March it was time to introduce the area to the high-tech smoking alternative that changed his life.

Although the Food and Drug Administration has yet to approve e-cigarettes as a smoking cessation mechanism, The Wall Street Journal predicts that sales will reach $1 billion this year.

Scavello said he is getting in on the ground floor of the boom and that before long shops like his will be popping up all over the Northeast.

“If you smoke one cigarette a day or three packs a day, I can accommodate you. It’s the safest way to deliver nicotine.”

A pack-a day-smoker might start out on 18 milligrams a day and slowly get weaned down to weaker juice, said Scavello, who can mimic the flavor of a smoker’s favorite brand, from Marlboro to Camel, or concoct tantalizing flavors that have nothing at all to do with tobacco.

Lots of customers are steaming — in a good way — over such infusions as chocolate, bacon and cherry Coke.

“I don’t just sell you something. I sit you down and find a flavor that suits you,” Scavello said.

With starter kits available for $27.99, smokers who become vapers will save themselves a ton of money in the long run, he said.

“The average person spends about 300 bucks a month on cigarettes,” he said. “A bottle of juice for $11.99 will last about a month and is economically a better choice. You can taste the same thing you’re now smoking, so why wouldn’t you transition?”

Officially, the shop is open 10 a.m. to 8 p.m., but Scavello, who runs his dad’s company, M. Scavello Inc., during the day while his wife takes care of the store, said he provides a 24-hour service.

“I get people at 1 o’clock in the morning who want to buy stuff, so I will come down and open up for them,” he said. “Because it’s so new people have a lot of questions. In this kind of business you build a relationship with your customers. It’s hard enough to quit smoking, let alone quitting smoking and going into a whole new world like vaping.”